Engineers are also considering how they could build a bridge across the Bering Strait.  Or, to be more precise, a series of three bridges spanning the Bering Strait, via the Diomede Islands.

As with a tunnel, the challenge of buildng a bridge from Russia to Alaska would not be insignificant.  According to the Discovery Channel (via Fogonazos blog):

Ice breakup after each winter is violent and would destroy normal bridge piers, so the 55-mile-long bridge would need 220 piers, cone-shaped to resemble and function like the bow of an icebreaker ship, and weighing 50,000 tons each.

And that’s even before you consider the thousands of miles of roads and railway lines that would be needed to connect the bridge to any of the major Siberian or North American transport routes.

If you want to know more, the Discovery Channel has an excellent interactive guide, with plenty of diagrams and pictures.

How to build a bridge across the Bering Strait is a post from: Siberian Light

Two Tu-95 bombers flew to the US island of Guam in the Pacific Ocean, paying a surprise visit to the US military base there. Shocked US pilots on the base were forced to scramble to intercept the Russian bombers.

The BBC has this quote from a beaming Russian General:

“It has always been the tradition of our long-range aviation to fly far into the ocean, to meet [US] aircraft carriers and greet [US pilots] visually. Yesterday [Wednesday] we revived this tradition, and two of our young crews paid a visit to the area of the base of Guam. I think the result was good. We met our colleagues – fighter jet pilots from [US] aircraft carriers. We exchanged smiles and returned home.”

The media are, of course, reporting it in rather sensationalist terms (“Russia sparks Cold War scramble” was the BBC’s uninspired effort), but yesterday’s “raid” shouldn’t really come as a surprise to anyone. Russia has been steadily raising the international profile of its military, popping up all over the place, from Scotland to the North Pole to the Pacific, reminding its old NATO adversaries that it is still around and, when grumpy enough, is still a force to be reckoned with.

What it really means is that the Russian military now has enough money in its budget to do things like actually fly its planes and to sail its maintained and more or less ship-shape navy out of port. To my mind this is infinitely preferable to having an uncared for fleet slowly rotting away and poisoning the world’s oceans with glowing nuclear waste.

Update: A US General, on the other hand, says that the Russian planes didn’t even get within 500 kilometers (300 miles) of Guam: “U.S. planes went to an orbit point in preparation for an intercept that never occurred because the Bears didn’t get close enough”.

Russian Tu-95 bombers intercepted over Guam is a post from: Siberian Light

“With talk of a new Cold War, and Russian President Vladimir Putin floating the possibility of aiming nuclear weapons at targets in Europe, how serious do you think the deterioration in relations is between Russia and the West? How should Western governments respond?” 

Among the commenters you might recognise are bloggers Robert Amsterdam and Russia Blog’s Yuri Mamchur.

Discussion: A New Cold War? is a post from: Siberian Light

Make no mistake about it – this was a serious, high level meeting.  Just take a look at this list of delegates:

In attendence with Kissinger were: Former Secretary of State George Schultz, former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin, former Special Representative for Arms Control, Nonproliferation and Disarmament Ambassador Thomas Graham Jr., former Senator Sam Nunn and Chevron Chairman and Chief Executive Officer David O’Reilly.

With Primakov were: Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, former Ambassador to Washington Yuly Vorontsov, Deputy Board Chairman of UES Russia Leonid Drachevsky, UC Rusal Deputy Chief Executive Officer Alexander Livshits and former Soviet Armed Forces Chief of Staff Mikhail Moiseyev.

You’d think that a meeting like this would be widely reported, especially as it comes slap bang in the middle of an international spat between Russia and the UK which is gaining massive media attention. 

But the meeting has been virtually ignored by the world’s media. 

A quick search of Google News for “Kissinger” and “Putin” brings up a measly 45 news stories.  One in the Guardian, another in the Moscow Times, and that’s about it.

I know that the participants in the meeting didn’t necessarily want to draw attention to themselves, but in today’s media obsessed (and Russia obsessed) age – how on earth did they get away with that??

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Henry Kissinger in talks with Putin is a post from: Siberian Light

“As a result of the excruciating and sluggish exchanges with the editors, the likes of which could only be found in diplomatic history, it was decided to give up trying to place Sergey Lavrov’s article in Foreign Affairs,” said a Foreign Ministry spokesman. 

Apparently, they were arguing over whether to include a sub-heading.  Foreign Affairs wanted to include one that implied that referred to the possibility of a new Cold War.  Lavrov didn’t. 

There’s a good overview of the spat at the New York Times (it’ll probably go behind a firewall soon, so read it quick), although Russophile rightly takes the NYT to task for some biased reporting towards the end of their ‘article’.  Foreign Affairs themselves have published their own take on the story on their website.

Anyway, following the spat, the Russian Foreign Ministry decided to publish Lavrov’s “Containing Russia: Back to the Future” article on their website.

I’ve just read it and, to be honest, it’s a bit dull.  I’d have been disappointed if I paid for Foreign Affairs only to find this bland restatement of Russia’s position on International Politics.

Essentially, it restates Russia’s belief in the Westphalians system of international sovereignty, it’s belief in a system of international rules, that the US pursuit of an ideological crusade for democracy is destabilising, that it’s only natural that a country should take advantage of its competitive advantages (ie. in Russia’s case, energy) in the international marketplace, and that if we all work together we can solve all the world’s problems.

Russian Foreign Minister pulls Foreign Affairs article is a post from: Siberian Light

Well, it’s hit the mainstream – big time. A (rather deranged, it must be said) CNN presenter, has decided that the money came right from the top:

“I have a sneaking suspicion that this counterfeiting can be traced all the way up to Putin himself. From arms and oil deals with everyone from Venezuela to Iran, this guy is in bed with evil. [...] So, Putin, one way or another… could he be behind this counterfeiting?

Don’t believe me? Watch the video for yourself:

Bonkers. And, if this constitutes prime time US journalism, ever so slightly scary. I mean, I remember that US news seemed terrible when I lived over there a few years ago, but I hadn’t realised it had gotten quite this bad.

(Thanks to Robert Amsterdam for the tip).

CNN takes fake $100 bill story, and runs with it is a post from: Siberian Light

The site, Allofmp3.com, was quietly closed as the Kremlin sought to end criticism from the United States that Russia was failing to clamp down on music and video piracy.

However, an alternative site run by the same Moscow company has already emerged. MediaServices says that mp3Sparks.com is legal under Russian law, using many of the same arguments advanced in support of allofmp3.com.

Somehow, I don’t really see this phoenix-from-the-ashes tactic fooling anyone in the record industry…

Anyway, I had a few dollars tucked away on Allofmp3 for a rainy day (I know, foolish when you consider the ongoing uncertainty over its future) so took a quick trip over to see what has changed.

I was amused to see that mp3Sparks.com is an exact replica of allofmp3.com – same catalogue, same basic design, same user IDs, it’s even transferred across every single allofmp3 user’s account!

My account, sadly, wasn’t working properly when I visited, so I’m not quite sure that my money is still mine, but when I emailed the mp3Sparks.com to check whether my password was still valid, a reply came back within minutes, which is a fairly positive sign.

Update 4 July:  In the comments ?????? has pointed out that mp3Sparks has gone the way of its older brother and is, itself, no more.  I guess someone sent the heavies round.

Allofmp3 dies, and is reborn is a post from: Siberian Light

Now, Kennebunkport isn’t the most exciting place to be if you’re a Russian Secret Service agent , and, well, you know how these Russians, they like their liquor:

A Russian man attempted to pass off a phony $100 bill at the New Hampshire State Liquor store shortly before 8 p.m. Thursday, according to the store manager, who said a cashier discovered the bill was bogus.

I’d have been more convinced by this story if the man was trying to buy vodka…

Putin advance team caught passing fake $100 bill is a post from: Siberian Light

If the US plan goes ahead as expected, high powered radars from Poland will be able to cover all of European Russia, and a good chunk of Siberia as well:

At the same time, it illustrates just why Central/Eastern Europe is such a perfect site for this anti-missile system.

• It’s directly in between any missiles that may be fired from Iran towards the US.
• It’s almost directly in between any missiles that might head towards Western Europe.
• It’s sufficiently far enough away to allow interceptors to be launched in good time.
• It’s perfectly placed to mesh with US-based radars covering the Atlantic and Arctic oceans.
• Oh yes – and it just happens to have a bonus feature allowing sneak peaks into Russian airspace…

(Hat tip: Cyrill Vatomsky, who posts his thoughts on the issue here).

A map of the Russia-US anti-missile dispute is a post from: Siberian Light

Details of exactly how such a scheme would work are a little sketchy at the moment, to say the least, but it seems as though the Kremlin envisage a system built primarily around the radar station they currently rent in Azerbaijan.

Dmitri Peskov, Mr Putin’s spokesman, insisted that a radar base in Azerbaijan would be sufficient to cover the whole of western Europe and that the use of Poland for interceptor rockets should be reconsidered. “The two sides could completely share the technological data of that station with equal control of the station . . . It would lead to a substantial easing of tension and it will solve the problem.”

In principle, I think it’s a good idea – and, with the benefit of my 20-20 hindsight – makes Putin’s brinkmanship of the past few weeks seem much more logical. Lets face it, Russia is at much at risk of missile attack from ‘rogue’ nations or terrorist groups as Western Europe and the United States – if not more so – and a joint missile shield does seem the logical way forward.

But will it happen in practice? I can see plenty of potential problems.

For starters, there is the whole trust issue. An effective joint shield would require a lot of actual joint working, and there isn’t a lot of evidence to suggest that Russia and the US could work well together on such a politically charged project. Although, having said that, there’s always a first time for everything…

Technical issues are also going to come to the forefront. NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, although welcoming Russia’s joint missile shield proposal, argued that a shield located in Azerbaijan wouldn’t be able to react in time to incoming missiles:

“It’s a bit close to the rogue states we are discussing.”

A shield located primarily in Azerbaijan wouldn’t cover all of NATO’s member states either.

I suppose this could be overcome by stationing the main radar in Azerbaijan, and the interceptor missiles somewhere else – say, in Poland – but for this would not only require phenomenal co-ordination, but would still probably require radars to be stationed too close to Russia’s Western borders. And wasn’t the whole point of Azerbaijan to avoid that…?

Ultimately, I don’t think this is anything more than a good idea, destined to failure – but I’d be happy to be proved wrong.

Update: For the true cynics among us, here another explantion as to why Putin offered to develop a joint missile shield based in Azerbaijan:

I think that the Russian base, there in Qabala [Azerbaijan] is getting ready — they’re going to lose the base, the lease on the base is going to expire, and they’ve already been making plans to relocate the radar to Krasnodar [Krai, in Russia]. And so what they’re trying to do here is legitimize their presence in Azerbaijan at the expense of the Azerbaijanis. And they will also permanently make the United States a target of the Iranians, and the Azeris, and it’s designed to divide the United States and Azerbaijan. And it creates a Russian military presence there, if I understand the statement correctly.

Cunning, or what?

Putin offers to work on joint missile shield is a post from: Siberian Light